Hey, look at this – an official SFFD operations memo. Just a draft, but nobody’s really working on hammering out the exact wording of detailed Fire Code sections here. No, this is more what you call “guidelines.”

Now arguably, this program is actual SFFD policy now and it’s has been policy since well before 2015, but of course most people in town don’t know about it. The new wrinkle, AFAIK, is that only ground floor bathrooms are covered. That means that a lot of stations won’t be able to help you.

I’ll bet a lot of firefighters don’t want to deal with these issues. I mean, if there’s a big call and a homeless person / anybody else from the general public doesn’t want to leave the bathroom just yet, the official SFFD bathroom escort might not know the best course of action.

Fire Station Restrooms: San Francisco Fire Stations with ground floor restroom facilities are available for public use. Members of the general public may use the ground floor restroom facilities between the hours of 9:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m.

If the Fire units within said Stations are called out for any emergency, the member of the public must also leave the facility immediately. Members of the public shall not be left behind alone in the Firehouse. Signs shall be posted by Station Captains on the doors of the facilities stating, “If there is an emergency dispatch and units must leave, anyone using this restroom facility must also leave immediately.”

The Fire Department employee that guides the member of the public to the bathroom facility shall also verbally inform the member of the public that they will have to leave the facility immediately, if an emergency call comes in and no units are available to stay behind.

The Fire Department employee that guides the member of the public into the facility is also responsible for escorting the member of the public back out of the Firehouse.

It is up to the Officer’s discretion if a member of the public is allowed to use the ground floor restroom facility. If the member of the public requesting to use the facility is inebriated or altered in any way, they shall not be allowed to use the restroom facility. The health and safety of our members and the security of the Firehouse shall also factor into the Officer’s discretion/decision.

Regarding visitors to the Firehouse, article 3950 still applies:

3950. VISITORS

Members shall not invite or allow visitors not on Department business to enter Department facilities before 1000 hours or after 2100 hours. Members shall only allow visitors into public areas of a Department station or facility. Members shall not invite or allow intoxicated persons in or about Department property, except for purposes of providing medical care.”

Hey, wasn’t this policy, or whatever you want to call it, in effect before gadfly Mike Petrelis took wing? I think so.

All the deets, from last month:

“Thank you for your advocacy to increased toilet access for San Franciscans. We are pleased to update you on the following efforts to increase bathroom availability:

Fire Station Restrooms: Nearly all of the San Francisco Fire Stations are open for public restroom use. Any member of the public may ring the Fire Station doorbell and will be let in to use the toilet between the hours of 9:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m.

Automatic Public Toilet Program: There are 25 self-cleaning public toilets in San Francisco. Here is a list of the locations:

“Pit Stop Program: San Francisco Department of Public Works has expanded their toilet access program from six toilets in three locations in the Tenderloin to include two toilets in the South of Market and to the Mission District where the Pit Stop program has taken over a JCDecaux public toilet.

“Outreach: To ensure that homeless individuals are aware of the bathroom options, flyers will be distributed at homeless shelters, via SFHOT, and at the Project Homeless Connect Every Day Connect office. Thank you again for your advocacy on this issue.

Anyway, yes, our drinking water comes from the Yosemite area [Please see Comments for this correction], from athousand li away. So, you’re oll korrect on that score, artiste de graffiti.

But IMO, the arrow points in the wrong direction. ‘Cause the Ladies Room doorway you can see there has toilets filled with the very same drinking water.

So yeah, SFPUC, the chairs you sit on up there above Civic Center are sustainable or whatever, and that, somehow, helped your new building become Platinum Leed certified or whatever, but what about your actual operations, man? Oh, you inherited a big chunk of flooded Yosemite and that’s the way you like it and you’ll fight to maintain your Way Of Life for as long as possible and that’s part of the reason why the “World Capital of Innovation” can’t worry about recycling any water at all? OK fine. Hey, SFGov, how about the water you spray on the street from the street sweepers? Oh, that’s drinking water so pure that you don’t need to filter it as well, huh? OK fine.

*Does the jogger have a white shirt with golden (red) hair or a blue shirt with black hair? Well, actually, my camera chose to give her white shirt a blue tinge, which I hastily fixed with one click. Anyway, when you do this kind of thing, everything in the background in direct sunlight goes to heck, but that’s white balance for you. In mitigation, the colors you see on the right side should be pretty much spot-on.

**IDK, that could be its name, who knows. Willie Brown will go to his grave having failed at having SFO and/or long long 3rd Street named after him, after decades of effort. (I think he eventually got an airport terminal or something.) But Gavin has a long road ahead of him afore the NAAWP or some other org will become the front organization for naming anything of significance after GCN.